


Waiting Place

by The_Wavesinger



Category: The Silmarillion and other histories of Middle-Earth - J. R. R. Tolkien
Genre: Death, Depression, F/F, Halls of Mandos
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-10-28
Updated: 2016-10-28
Packaged: 2018-08-24 00:22:23
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,657
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8348947
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/The_Wavesinger/pseuds/The_Wavesinger
Summary: In the Halls of Mandos, Míriel drifts.





	

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Isilloth](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Isilloth/gifts).



> Whether the House of Vaire was inside or outside the Halls of Mandos is not clear in canon; I've chosen to have it outside.
> 
> Please note the warnings; depression is a major story element. In addition, there are lots of discussions of death and some blink-and-you'll miss it mentions of suicide ideation.
> 
> I hope you enjoy this, Isilloth; I had lots of fun writing for you, and I hope you don't mind me combining both your prompts for Miriel!

She drifts.

There is nothing where she is ( _the Halls_ , some part of her mind supplies), and she welcomes the nothingness. She is tired, and she could not have gone on as she was before. The nothingness strips her of the weight of her exhaustion, though the ache still echoes in her soul.

There is nothing here, and Míriel is glad.

 

* * *

 

Time is undefined in the Halls. There is very little difference between a minute and a year (or what would be a minute or a year in the outside world).

Míriel counts the seconds, sometimes, but always, inevitably, she loses track, and oblivion subsumes her once more.

 

* * *

 

Fëanáro and Finwë float, on occasion, to the surface of her thoughts.

She is tired, still. She loved Fëanáro, but does not know him. She loves Finwë, but cannot give him more than she has already given.

 

* * *

 

There are no shapes in the Halls, no spaces; nothing is defined in relation to another thing. It is a realm of _fëa_ rather than of body, and it is the senses of the soul, hidden things which Míriel would not, in life, have known existed, which are used to navigate this realm.

 

* * *

 

Míriel feels, sometimes, a presence next to her, watching her. She cannot bring herself to care.

 

* * *

 

Apathy. Complete, utter apathy.

This is what has replaced Míriel's exhaustion. She _knows_ , but she cannot care. Images and thoughts, pictures of her past life, flash at moments through her memory, but she is strangely disconnected from them. And she thinks, _Fëanáro, Finwë,_ and something stirs inside her, but the stirring is not enough.

 

* * *

 

The presence is stronger, now. Míriel feels, sometimes, the brush of _fëa_ against _fëa,_ a touch that sends shivers through her soul.

It is intense and strangely comforting all at once.

 

* * *

 

The first time the presence coalesces into a woman, Míriel ignores it.

One of the Maiar of Mandos, perhaps, here to guard her, to keep watch on her, perhaps, to ensure that she heals properly.

She cannot heal. Not now, maybe not ever. Something inside her is missing, some part of her from which her love of life sprung, and no watching Maiar can help her regain that.

 

* * *

 

The presence is a woman, now. Not a woman in the physical sense, for there is no form in the Halls, but as if the presence had said: _I am a woman_.

Strange, Míriel thinks, idly, but also interesting. And yet—

The woman is gone.

Míriel drifts.

 

* * *

 

The one thing Míriel longs for, the only experience of her body that she misses, are her tapestries.

The satisfaction of work well done, the patterns emerging as she wove, all this she misses. Not with any fierce ache, true, only a few fleeting thoughts, a handful of ' _I wish_ 's, but it is longing all the same.

 

* * *

 

The presence—the woman—touches Míriel more, and sometimes, there are glimpses of thoughts and words and emotions.

Nothing concrete, just snatches of images, but it is still more than Míriel has known is however long she has been in the Halls.

She tells herself that she does not long for these moments.

(The truth is, she _does_ want. She has never been very good at lying to herself.)

 

* * *

 

Time creeps by. The Halls are timeless, but they do not stand still in time, a paradox which Míriel feels even as she does not understand, and she knows the outside world runs on without her.

She does not care.

She is less tired, now, but at the same time, she cannot let go of her exhaustion, and she still longs for an oblivion which will not come. Even here, in the Halls, there are thoughts; she is still aware of what passes for _the world_.

 _Please_ , she screams (if _fëar_ can scream), but does not know what she pleads for.

 

* * *

 

Míriel longs for the presence of the woman, but ignored her. There is— _something,_ a reigniting, a spark she has not felt since before, something which blooms into being when the woman is there, and she wants, she wants terribly to have that flare of life back. But.

But she is afraid. Horribly, awfully, terribly afraid. How can she, how can she take that step, how is it possible, she cannot pull herself out of this mess. Not alone, and what is she if not alone? (The woman is there, but the woman is also not. She is a presence, but not enough that Míriel _knows_.)

 

* * *

 

Sometimes, Míriel thinks, still of Finwë and Fëanáro. What are they doing? Are they mourning her? Have they moved on?

(Selfishly, she wishes for them to grieve her even as they go on with their life. She will not go back, it is true, but she wants to be missed nonetheless.)

She cares, but not enough.

 

* * *

 

There are touches, too, from the presence, now. If she still had her body, she would call them fleeting touches, brushes against elbow or hand or cheek. As it is (different from the physical, but not so different as one would think), her _fëa_ thrills at these caresses, and Míriel does not understand why.

 

* * *

 

And then everything changes.

There is a man before her (Námo, it must be Námo, who else could it be here?), grave-faced, speaking of Finwë and happiness and re-marriage and duty, and giving her what boils down to an ultimatum. _Leave now, or remain, forever, in these Halls._

Míriel cannot grasp that. She is bewildered, befuddled, clutching at shreds of thought, her peace suddenly disturbed by this intruder, and by noise from the outside world. And yet she thinks, _how dare he._ And, _if he must make me choose, then there is no choice._

And so she gives her answer, and sinks back into the quiet of the Halls.

 

* * *

 

The woman is still there; Miriel can feel her presence. A presence that is almost constant, now, never leaving. It is a strange comfort, to know that there is somebody watching her, waiting with her.

Minutes, years, days, time—some manner of time passes. Within the Halls, nothing changes.

 

* * *

 

And then.

Then.

There is a voice. (Not a voice, truly, but—something else. Voice is the close approximation Míriel can think of.) The voice is that of a woman, too, and Míriel connects it, intuitively, to the presence.

_Míriel._

At first, Míriel does not respond. She has thought she heard words spoken, before, but they were always imaginings.

But then:

_Míriel._

_Míriel._

And the whisper, again, louder now, and if she speaks (verbalizes, really, in the strange form of communication that is allowed to her), and there is no voice, who would be there to hear her make a fool of herself?

_Who speaks?_

A pause. Then, _it is I. The Weaver. Vairë._

A Vala. Míriel's fëa shrinks, instinctively, into itself, remembering Námo.

 _Míriel,_ Vairë says, again, but Míriel does not respond.

After a while, Vairë leaves.

 

* * *

 

Míriel sinks deep into her thoughts for a long while; it is only when she feels Vairë's presence that she realizes time has passed (maybe. She cannot pretend to understand the flow of time and the nature of space in the Halls).

 _Míriel,_ Vairë says, _I will not harm you. I want to show you something._

Míriel does not know whether this is the truth; how can she? But—

Whatever Vairë can do to harm her, Míriel does not care. And so she says, _show me._

And Vairë does.

 

* * *

 

Míriel sees—

Colour.

She _sees_ , and she sees colour, and after so long spent in nothingness, it is an impossibility, a miracle, and then she sees that they are tapestries, beautifully woven pictures, images, perfect details, stretching out until she feels dizzy in her attempt to find the end of this splendor.

 _History,_ Vairë says, and even _her_ tone is reverent, _this is the march of the years, the tale of the passing of the ages. It is recorded, and will continue to be recorded, until the end of Arda._

The tapestries are beautiful in their awfulness, in their beauty and terrible sadness; Míriel sees the skill that has gone into them and is awed, but cannot, also, unsee the years marching by, the pictures stained with defilement and horrors.

 

* * *

 

Míriel wonders, afterwards, why. There was beauty, and there was ugliness, in those tapestries, but she saw, constantly, evil defiling good, and she knows, again, that there is no point.

(She does not voice these thoughts to Vairë, whose presence is still almost-constant.)

 

* * *

 

 _I saw you,_ Vairë says, _before. Not often, but when I saw you, at festivals or the like, I would think that you are beautiful_

If she still had a body, Míriel would have blushed.

 

* * *

 

Seeing the tapestries becomes a happening that is— _regular,_ Míriel would say, if she could measure the passing of time. (So many of the words she used to depend on are no longer relevant to the life (if death can be called life) she has now.)

Míriel is entranced by them even as she hates the history of violence woven through their threads. It is her worst fear come to pass long ago, her worst memories of Cuiviénen bought to life. And yet there is _colour_ in the tapestries, colour that she thought was something she lost with death, and always, always, it draws her back.

 

* * *

 

Vairë is unknown, an unfamiliar being, in the sense that Míriel has not _known_ her and shared her life as she had so many others'. And yet it seems to Míriel that she has known the Valië her whole life. Maybe it is the fact that, in this place, Vairë is the only person she has contact with, the only person from whom Míriel is not wholly separate.

 

* * *

 

The tapestries remind Míriel of her work, and she longs for her fingers, itches for cloth and needle and thread. Ideas spring up, and she cannot bring them to life.

 

* * *

 

 _Do you,_ Vairë asks, _dislike seeing the tapestries?_

 _No._ Míriel is emphatic in her response. The story they tell is that of hope failing, and they excite a terrible longing, but, in spite of all that, Míriel cannot bear to lose them. And Vairë must know of the pain of seeing hope flicker out, repeatedly—she is far older than Míriel, and has seen the way of the world from the moment of its conception—but the other reason, Míriel feels, she should explain. _They—I used to weave, before._

(She does not realize, then, what she has admitted to: a before. She did not live in these Halls, before. She is not of them.)

Vairë is silent, for a moment. Then, _Tell me of them._

And Míriel begins to speak.

 

* * *

 

Once she starts, she cannot stop. She talks of everything she loved in life—her craft, the feel of the fresh breeze on her face, songs sung at twilight by a campfire in long-lost Ennor, the stars glittering in the sky as she lay in the grass and looked up. The memories pour out of her, bright-coloured pictures laced with wistfulness.

(There is unhappiness, too, terrible unhappiness, but Míriel is trying not to remember this, now.)

 

* * *

 

Míriel longs for her body. There are touches, sometimes, from Vairë, which make her ache for the form she left behind, for the taste of desire. The spirit is sterile, and she longs for flesh to enact her passion.

 

* * *

 

 _I want to show you something,_ Vairë says.

_Show me, then._

_Do you trust me?_

_I do._

At those words, Míriel feels a shudder run through—her? The Halls? She cannot tell, for the world narrows down to _feeling_ , feeling and sensation and _joy_ , and Vairë is inside her, she can feel the echo of her thoughts and feelings and desires and wants and memories, and Vairë is her and she is Vairë and—

 _This is called the melding of spirits,_ Vairë says. _It is a craft of the soul, of energy; among the Valar, we reserve this sort of communion for intimate partners_ —And a strange hesitation, but it is gone as soon as it comes; in this state, they can both feel the deepest parts of the other's being, and there is no doubting their feelings for each other.

 

* * *

 

And it is beautiful, and their spirits meld, and Vairë holds it for as long she is able to (pure energy melding is a horrifically difficult task, she tells Míriel, even if the results are worth the labour). But—

But it does not compare to the sensations of the body. Or maybe it is better, for Vairë, but not for Míriel. Míriel is a creature of the flesh, and now, belatedly, she wishes that she had never left her body behind.

 

* * *

 

The bone-deep ache ( _if_ she still had bones, it would be bone-deep, at least) of her weariness is still there, but it is intensified, now, by sharp pangs of longing for her body, for her unsatisfactory companionship with Vairë to blossom into something fuller.

Not even the carnal (though she cannot deny her wish for desire); most of all, Míriel longs for touch, and for words; to hear Vairë's voice, truly, to see her, to feel her skin, to be able to sit with her head in her lap

(And maybe it is presumptuous; maybe, beyond the Halls, Vairë would not want to love her. But Míriel dreams.)

 

* * *

 

 _Míriel,_ Vairë says, _the Halls are a waiting place._ _They are not meant to be a forever-dwelling._

And Míriel says, _I know. But I cannot go back. The Valar have decreed it._ And, after a pause, _I do not want to leave if leaving means losing you._

 

* * *

 

They do not talk of re-embodiment again for a long while; Míriel looks at the tapestries and looks away, again; there is unrest in Valinor, and she does not want to think of the consequences of this, does not want to dwell on what is happening in a world she cannot rejoin.

And then, Vairë says, _you will have a body again. You will be brought back to life._ And softer, that is, _if you wish to._

Míriel is, for a time, shocked into silence. Then, _truly?_

 _Truly,_ Vairë affirms.

And she wants, she wants oh so badly. But _—and you? Will I be permitted to see you, after?_ (And if the answer is no, Míriel will refuse. Of course she will.)

Vairë's fëa glitters in, what would be, in a body, laughter. _Míriel, Míriel—you will be staying with me. That is the condition of your release, that, though you may venture out into Aman, you must dwell with me. Námo would not allow it otherwise. Although,_ (and here, discomfort and fear bleed into her tone, emotions Míriel has seen her express scarce few times) _if that is displeasing to you, we could_

 _No! No, of course not!_ And, if Míriel had a body (and she would have a body, soon), in this moment, she would have danced with joy.

(She does not ask after the _how_. There is always a price to pay; she will learn the price of her life later. For now, she wants to enjoy the moment.)

 

* * *

 

Míriel stands on the path leading away from the Halls of Mandos, the gravel hard under her feet (her _feet_ ), her hair blowing in the breeze. She feels every gust of wind tickling her skin, hears every small noise, and takes in the trees and the twisted road that winds ahead of her. It is marvellous, she thinks, to be alive.

“Míriel?” The voice of Vairë's _fána_ is low and gravelly, yet melodic, and when Míriel turns to face her, her breath catches at the complete, utter beauty of her lover.

Re-embodiment takes time, and it had been a long, frustrating process, but as she stands here, Míriel knows it is worth it.

“Míriel?” Vairë asks again.

“Vairë,” Míriel says, and, lifting her head up, kisses her.


End file.
